This is a great sounding AUD. 5 stars for SQ. I was there. Two points from the below reviews. 1] Aside from the tour, one reason why you hear straining in their voices is it was sunny and dry for those two days. Dirt was being kicked around by small gusts of wind. combine that with everyone walking in to the park up the dirt road and by day two it was a bit lung clogging for sure. 2] Bill Graham himself handed us tickets. We arrived about 3 AM and walked up to the gates to see what we could see. Five seconds after we asked the BGP blue vest what up, Bill shows up riding a mountain bike, says hello to the dude, then looks at us and says, "You need tickets?". OF course we said yes, and he handed us two sets of tickets. Then Bill hands the guard about 50 tickets and says, give them to anyone who walks up and asks. To the one who claimed it was all set up in advance, I can see that, OR I can see it just happening "organically". SO MUCH FUN in that town for those two days!!

Not the greatest shows I ever saw in the 80's, but the scene was great. We purchased tickets through mail order in advance, but nobody ever bothered checking them. Tickets were everywhere; when we pulled off to the side of the road to wait for a friend, the sheriff stopped and politely told us we couldn't park there, and by the way, would we like to buy his extra tickets?

Show starts a litte slow (what's up with the 6 min. Franklins??), but by the 2nd set it is on and poppin'. Excellent LLR, deep, deep Eyes, unusual post-drums positioning for Bertha and a solid effort on the Dew. Good show, and I'm sure this was a great venue and fun time for all:)

tix were sold over mail order (I got mine)and they were otherwise impossible to get before the shows. The hotline had all kinds of warnings, no ticky no entry to the town! I was at Red Rocks right before that and scalpers had tix for $300!!!

I think they just didn't want 100 thousand people invading the town since everyone knew these were special shows. When I arrived with my buddy we had to walk up the hill into town (no cars beyond that point). 5 minutes after we arrived from hitching from Red Rocks we are walking up the hill and none other than Phil Lesh is walking down the sidewalk towards us with a woman, baby and a bag of groceries! Welcome to Telluride! We said "Hi Phil", he said hi back and we kept on walking. Great start to a great weekend.

Later that night in the bars we ran into Bill and Brent in a bar. They were toasted! I'm trying to get a beer and next thing you know Brent is standing next to me. I said "Hey Brent how are you?" He says "great, there a lot of cute chicks in here"? It was hysterical. They hung for a beer and then bailed. You could tell they were having as much fun as everyone else. Unforgettable.

they were free and it was all set up from the get go. truth be told. I dont think it was ment to happen that way it just did. I too was one of many who thought we may not get in to town with out a ticket,who knew........ as far going in and out of the shows all day it was a peacful easy feeling. I too agree the rocks shows were better but i have a theory to that point. i think we that were on tour in those good old days just felt the coming vib of teluride and enjoyed the rocks to fullest .

this/these show(s) fuckin rocked! the playing was better this night as I remember, but t.ride was unquestionably one of the best venues the boys ever played. amazing, way before telluride became snatched up by rich, white folks....sick scarlet/fire, sickest scenery....this was really fucking awesome! harmonic convergence, etc...very special shows these were...last good southwest/rocks tour....phil/jerry so strong in s/f, eyes, dew, etc...good first set on sunday....thanks guys...

Hey now, I never been to Colorado for a Dead show. These shows in Telluride have a special quality to them. Vocals are strained, the band musta screamed their lungs out at Red Rocks. All the boys have a stressed sound in their voices.
The playing is crisp,but it's the intesity in their voices that impress me. They all were tired but they gave their best on these days. Well worth a listen.

There was a mail order for these and Red Rocks around the time of Alpine in June. They sold out day one. It seemed not many people I knew got filled. We reserved a condo at the Coonskin Inn and with the rooms got tickets and a parking pass to enter town (there's only one way into town by vehicle). Through Red Rocks the buzz was don't go without tickets you won't get close to town. Bill Graham took out full page ads in the Denver Post requesting those without tickets to not come to Telluride. We left Red Rocks on Friday and in those days it was about a 7 hour drive. The last large town before you head up toward Telluride is Montrose. There on Main Street was a record store with a large line and show tickets for sale. We continued to town and there was a check point for only those with car passes to enter town and by that point tickets were everywhere. Nice work Bill. Bill owned a house in town and appealed personally to Town Counsel to throw these shows. He had this planned out in advance. Yes they collected tickets, but you could leave and enter the venue (Town Park) at any time during the show. And by day two tickets were entirely unnecessary. By the way, although the town and festive atmosphere were memorable, all shows at Red Rocks days earlier were superior.

I think this might be the best audience recording of '87 on the archive. The show's fairly standard but sound is top notch.

Show wasn't "free" as the previous post suggest (I've got a paid ticket to prove it), but for many shows were always free anyway, right?

One interesting thing about these shows is that they happened in a beautiful remote place (before a lot of the outside world began to buy it up) and it took place on the harmonic convergence...check out wikipedia for some background on this rare astrological alignment.
Stars being aligned can't hurt a sweet show.

These two telluride shows (Aug15/16/87) are top quality all the way...Check out Uncle John's > Big River...Bright Show w/ Billy Graham too... Well Worth the download trip...

Free show, sweet place, beauitiful day. Scarlet was the highlight for me. Quality is not the best (3) but the atmoshpere was supurb (5).